“His relatives and authorities of the Catholic Church have asked to visit him or give him food and water; the request has been denied by the authorities of the Nicaraguan Penitentiary System,” she said.
“We know that no one who is in the conditions which the bishop is in can be well,” concluded Molina, who is the author of the report “Nicaragua: A Persecuted Church?,” which details 396 attacks that the Church in the Central American country has suffered in recent years.
Lesther Alemán, a young university student who was imprisoned for rebuking dictator President Daniel Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, for the killing of young people in the 2018 protests, said in a March 4 Twitter post that the authorities denied that Álvarez is in the La Modelo prison.
“Today, authorities from ‘La Modelo’ didn’t allow Bishop Álvarez access to water. Likewise, they denied that our bishop was there.”
“His family doesn’t know his whereabouts, because everywhere they go they deny he’s there. The regime should respond! Where is Bishop Álvarez?” questioned the young man, who now resides in the United States.
In another tweet, Alemán, who belongs to the Nicaraguan University Alliance, expressed his solidarity with the bishop.